


Be All But Overcome

by ALsannan



Category: To All the Boys I've Loved Before Series - Jenny Han, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (2018)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, etc. - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 11:56:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15994691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ALsannan/pseuds/ALsannan
Summary: It’s become clear she doesn’t read the notes. He’s made his point with Gen. There’s no reason to keep writing anymore.Still....you don’t know what that skirt does to me, Covey.





	Be All But Overcome

**Author's Note:**

> So, i read the books. Full disclosure, I did not love them--not nearly as much as I enjoyed the movie. But I can't unknow the history of Lara Jean and Peter now and it is so precious!

_Admit I’m better at climbing trees than you._

 

She’s an energetic drunk. He feels like he should have seen this coming.

After all, before they started fake dating, he had her pegged for quiet, sweet, sort of timid. He’s learned since then; Lara Jean’s never what you expect. By all outward appearances, her two favorite activities are reading books and staying home so _of course_ she’s the kind of girl who has two vodka cranberries and thinks she can do parkour. _Of course_.

Her laughter is a soft sound, like the rustle of the leaves all around her. Moonlight silver’s her profile, makes her eyes glitter in the dark.

“If I fell, would you catch me?”

This, too, he should have seen coming. The way she can make his heart race with just a few words.

He vaults himself into the tree, one branch beneath her in a second, when it took her at least five minutes to get as high. Her mouth forms a perfect oh.

“Your limbs are longer than mine,” she huffs.

He winks.

 

* * *

 

 

_I don’t remember your favorite flavor of gum anymore._

 

He hasn’t thought about middle school or the tree house in a long time. It’s funny the way it comes to him all at once, standing in the aisle at 7/11, mulling the distinction between orbit and juicy fruit. Or maybe it was seeing her in the tree the other night that brings back that summer between sixth and seventh grade, when Gen and Chris had both been dragged to Disneyworld by their parents (the horror) and Trevor had gone to sleepaway camp (so jealous) and John Ambrose McClaren had signed up for model U.N. practice that lasted from ten until six (it makes sense now, why they didn’t stay friends).

It was the first summer the tree house gang hadn’t spent together. A sign of things to come, but they hadn’t known it yet.

It was the first time he and Lara Jean were ever alone.

“Definitely not this one,” He remembers eleven year old Lara Jean plucking the piece of gum from her mouth daintily (or, as dainty as you can be, taking a half chewed piece of gum out of your mouth)

He had grinned with a wicked thought. “Here, try this!” he offers her the piece he’s been chewing, falls over laughing as she screams “Gross!” and backs into the wall. The tree house shakes.

They’d been at it for hours. When he’d found out she’d never tried any kind of gum, he’d been shocked—but he’d always liked solving problems; had a thing for a damsel, even back then.

He can still remember the way her eyes lit up when he came into the tree house and spread fifty packs of gum on the floor, every flavor he could find.

He can’t remember what they picked, in the end, only remembers that sticky sweet taste on his tongue, little Lara Jean’s laugh when he tried to blow a bubble big enough to impress her and the whole thing blew up in his face.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s become clear she doesn’t read the notes. He’s made his point with Gen. There’s no reason to keep writing anymore. Still.

 

* * *

 

 

She sits in front of him in English.

Sometimes, the tips of her inky black hair spill over his textbook. Sometimes, when she brushes it over one shoulder, he gets a glimpse of the freckles that snake beneath the collar of her shirt. She’s a diligent student, focused, but every once in a while she’ll turn around and smile at him and he doesn’t remember when this class became the one he looks forward to all day, but he’s here now.

It’s a Tuesday when she walks in disheveled, juggling her books in her hand, tugging at her scrunchie. He’s got a dozen questions but the teacher starts talking as soon as she sits. The lesson is dull but he’s sitting straight up in his seat, laser focused.

One of her knee socks is curling, slowly inching down her calf. There’s a smooth expanse of skin, the soft curve down to her ankle. He tries not to imagine running his hand along it, tries not to think of what it would be like to tug that sock up for her, fix it in place, let his fingers linger where the hem meets skin.

He jolts when the bell rings—so badly people actually turn around. He hasn’t taken any notes. Lara Jean waits for him by the door but he waves her on. It’s not until he’s sure she’s in the hallway that he rips the piece of paper out of his notebook. Hesitates. Presses the pen down until the ink bleeds. Thinks better of writing it down. Does it anyway.

 

_…you have to stop wearing knee socks to school. My GPA can’t take it._

 

* * *

 

 

His friends love her, especially Gabe.

It’s after a party and they’re all in the empty parking lot of a Target on the far side of town. Lara Jean in sitting on the hood of his car while he and the boys arrange their traffic cone course (which is half traffic cones, half random crap they found lying around, and at least one of his midfielder’s shoes)

“Gentlemen!” She cries, hands cupped to make her voice louder, “Start your engines…”

He hears the rattle of shopping carts over uneven pavement. See’s two of his best defensemen rolling themselves into position at the top of the makeshift track, armed with helmets and their lacrosse sticks.

“Only the bravest dare to enter the traffic cone course.”

There are oooohs all around. Martinez crushes a beer can on his head. Idiot.

Lara Jean is laughing, “Only the boldest of these boys who wish to be men, only the most virile of our youth, dare to test their valor thus!”

The shouts are reaching a fever pitch. Feet stomp the ground. The boys bang on the hoods of their cars, beat fists against chests.

“Will it be you, who travels the length of the parking lot, to meet your fate eye to eye?” Lara Jean’s voice reaches a timber he’s never heard before, “Or, shall you perish in the attempt?”

All those years of reading bodice rippers have made her melodramatic but her audience eats it up. The boys are hollering now, howling at the moon like frat pledges.

“Get on with it, LJ!” Nick shouts, voice muffled by his mouth piece. He’s so keyed up, his trembling actually shakes the cart.

She cackles—a sound he never thought he’d hear coming out of that perfect mouth, those soft pink lips, not ever—and then she shouts into the night sky.

“COMMENCE!”

The shopping carts nearly tip with the force of the starting push. They picked a part of the parking lot that tilts slightly down hill and they pick up speed faster than anyone intended. The noise around him is deafening as his teammates egg each other on, but he’s not listening to any of them. He’s looking at her. Standing now, balanced on the front bumper of his car with her arms in the air. Shouting and waving and laughing, like he’s never seen her before and all at once he feels like…

…like he’s never seen her before.

They both tip over spectacularly, neither of them makes it to the finish line. Gabe’s cart stays slightly more inside though, so the guys call it a win. They hoist him up on their shoulders, carry him over to Lara Jean on her makeshift jeep throne. He offers her his helmet. She wears it like a crown. They pick her up too then, ignoring her yelp, and carry her all around the parking lot warbling a horribly off key, drunken ballad.

On Monday at school, she tries to give the helmet back. Gabe gallantly (loudly) refuses. Insists it belongs to her now.

He writes the note in chem, slips it into her locker before his free period.

 

_If Gabe gets a letter, we’re going to have words Covey._

 

* * *

 

 

She’s the only person in the whole class to get a perfect score on the English test.

She makes a little noise in her throat when it’s passed back, turns around and smacks it on his desk like it’s a gauntlet, thrown.

He makes a big deal of acting unimpressed, eyebrows going up, head thrown back. “I guess you’re the one who threw off the curve.” He’s having trouble keeping the smile off his face.

“Damn straight!” Her eyes go wide immediately.

He really can’t stop himself from laughing now, “Did you, Lara Jean Song Covey, just curse?”

She rolls her eyes, but she’s giggling too. She leans over his desk, lowers her voice, “I got too excited! I guess. I didn’t think I’d done well at all.”

He’s fully grinning at the way her nose crinkles when she’s laughing, the way her eyes sparkle when she looks at him, the way he feels when sees the word excited forming on those perfect lips. “We’ve all got nothing on you, Covey.”

The smile on her face feels like it’s just for him. She nods, agreeing, “not today. See?” Points to the red mark at the top of her test, the word the teacher has underlined next to the big, bold, 100.

 

_You think you’re perfect, Lara Jean? You’re right._

 

* * *

 

 

All the Lacrosse girlfriends paint their boyfriends number on their cheeks for games.

Lara Jean flatly refuses. Says a lot of unflattering things about cattle branding, marking territory, and if he was looking for a billboard why didn’t he try fake dating that instead? Truth is, he couldn’t care less if she actually does it or not, he’s ready to drop it as soon as the topic comes up, only… he can’t help but admire the way her eyes spark. The way she says what she thinks, no hesitation. He wonders if she realizes how good she is at talking when she decides to open her mouth.

It’s getting harder not to say any of this to her.

So, he says something stupid, instead. “It’s in the contract.”

Which is not strictly true, and definitely beside the point. She looks like she’s about to say as much when something over his shoulder catches her eye. Her face, always an open book, seems to slam shut.

He turns and Gen murmurs, “Good luck tonight, Peter,” as she passes. His number is prominently displayed on her cheek.

He turns to Lara Jean, at a loss for words. She recovers first.

“We’ll compromise,” she says, and walks away like nothing happened.

He wonders what a compromise between the two of them would look like. He doesn’t have to wonder long.

It’s a plaid skirt, a tiny scrap of fabric in the school colors. There are some wolf whistles when she walks down the hallway after lunch that make her blush a pretty pink and the sight of that alone nearly makes him say it out loud, what he wants, the only thing he’s wanted for a very long time, right then, right there.

When she reaches him, she looks up at him from below her eyelashes, shy. She says, “…just this once.”

She runs up to him on the field, right before the game is about to start, and presses a kiss to his cheek in front of everyone on the bleachers. His skin tingles where her lips touch. He meets her eyes, dark, full of reflected lights and sees something fierce, something that makes him remember what she said about marking territory. The note he presses into her hand is his boldest yet. The only thing he’s been able to think for hours.

 

_You don’t know what that skirt does to me, Covey._

 

* * *

 

 

He goes to hand her the note but she just stares at it, doesn’t try to take it from him.

“What are we doing, Peter?”

“…we’re heading to fifth period.”

She shakes her head. Still doesn’t take the note.

“No, I mean—why are we still pretending?”

He hears it once, one way, hears it again, the way he wants to hear it. Can’t sort them out in his head, for a second. Not even sure he wants to try.

She looks like she might be on the point of tears.

He opens his mouth to say something, something he’s already sure will be incredibly ill-advised, it’s the wrong moment, they’re not alone in the hallway, he can’t do it, he can’t wait a second longer—

She grabs the note out of his hand, turns on her heel and takes long, hurried strides away from him. He knows already what the next note is going to say.

 

_You wrote me first. You started this, Lara Jean. Don’t ask me to finish it._


End file.
